Grand Courier Eurasian Chess

Introduction

GCE-Chess is my second (and final?) extension of Eurasian Chess by adding pieces from the Courier/Courier-spiel branch of the CV family. It retains all the piece types from Courier Eurasian Chess and then adds an orthogonal equivalent of the Elephant (the Warmachine), as well as a Guard and Champion. It also returns to a square board (12x12) rather than rectangular (14x10).

Initial Array

Notes on the board

• To allow for the increased number of pieces from 16 in FIDE chess to 36 in GCE-chess the board increases to 144 squares.
• The board density (piece/cell ratio) at commencement is thus maintained at the FIDE 50%.
• In keeping with the Asian influence a river separates the board between the 6th and 7th ranks.
• There is however no royal palace to restrict the King and his court. The King however is not permitted to cross the river; a restriction that also applies to the Fool, Elephant, and Warmachine.
• Kings are also not allowed to occupy the same orthogonal or diagonal if there are no intervening pieces between them.

Piece Relationships

Family/Direction	Diagonal	Orthogonal	Both
Sliders	Courier	Chariot	Queen
Screeners	Arrow	Cannon	Leo
Hop or Step	Elephant	Warmachine	Champion
Family/Type	Leap	Step	Both
Bent	Horse	Fool	Sage
Straight	Guard	King	Champion
Other	Pawn

Notes on Piece Relationships

• There are 15 piece-types.
• The step-riders move linearly restricted only by other pieces and the edges of the board. They come in two families -
  • Sliders - which may capture the first enemy piece in their path.
  • Screeners - which move as sliders when not capturing, but must leap over one and only one piece (the screen) when capturing.
• The non-riders make a single step or a hop (a double step unhindered by any piece occupying the first step.
  • The bi-directional step-hop piece is the Champion which combines the uni-directional moves of the Elephant and Warmachine).
  • The Champion's movement may also be seen as a combination of a step (King or Fool) with a hop in the same direction (Guard).
  • Where the hop changes direction (Horse) from that of the step (orthogonal-to-diagonal) the combination piece is the Sage.

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